In response, Pope Alexander VII, with the help of Discalced Carmelite friars, by 1662, was able to reunite the majority of the dissidents with the Catholic Church. After a half-century administration under the Goa Archdiocese, dissidents held the Coonan Cross Oath in 1653 as a protest. Through the Synod of Diamper of 1599, the Malabar Church was subjected directly under the authority of the Latin Catholic Padroado Archbishopric of Goa and the Jesuits. He was the Metropolitan of Angamaly (1568-1597) and given the title of "Metropolitan and Gate of all India". Mar Abraham of Angamaly was among the last of Chaldean bishops. Throughout the later half of the 16th century, the Malabar Church was under Chaldean Catholic jurisdiction. After the schism of 1552, a faction of the Church of the East came in communion with the Holy See of Rome ( Chaldean Catholic Church) and the Church of the East collapsed due to internal struggles. As such it is a part of Syriac Christianity by liturgy and heritage. The Syro-Malabar Church employs an Indianised variant of the Liturgy of Saints Addai and Mari belonging to the historic Church of the East, which dates back to 3rd century Edessa, Upper Mesopotamia. The Church of the East shared communion with the Great Church (Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy and Oriental Orthodoxy) until the Council of Ephesus in the 5th century, separating primarily over differences in Christology and due to political reasons. The earliest recorded organised Christian presence in India dates to the 4th century, when Persian missionaries of the East Syriac Rite tradition, members of what later became the Church of the East, established themselves in modern-day Kerala and Sri Lanka. The Church traces its origins to the evangelistic activity of Thomas the Apostle in the 1st century. The Syro-Malabar Church is the largest of the Thomas Christian denominations and the third largest sui juris Church in the Catholic communion, with a population of 4.25 million worldwide as estimated in the Annuario Pontificio 2016. The Syro-Malabar Church is primarily based in India with 5 metropolitan archeparchies (archdioceses) and 10 suffragan eparchies in Kerala, there's 17 eparchies in other parts of India, and 4 eparchies outside India. It is the second largest Eastern Catholic Church in the Catholic communion, after the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. The name has been in usage in official Vatican documents since the nineteenth century.
Syro-Malabar is a prefix coined from the words Syriac as the church employs the East Syriac Rite liturgy, and Malabar which is the historical name for modern Kerala. The Major Archiepiscopal Curia of the Church is based in Kakkanad, Kochi. The Syro-Malabar Synod of Bishops canonically convoked and presided over by the Major Archbishop constitutes the supreme authority of the Church. The Church is headed by the Metropolitan and Gate of all India Major Archbishop Mar George Cardinal Alencherry. It is part of the Major Archiepiscopal Churches of the Catholic Church that are not distinguished with a patriarchal title.
The Syro-Malabar Church is an autonomous ( sui iuris) particular church in full communion with the pope and the worldwide Catholic Church, including the Latin Church and the 22 other Eastern Catholic Churches, with self-governance under the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches (CCEO). The Syro-Malabar Catholic Church ( Syriac: ܥܸܕܬܵܐ ܩܵܬܘܿܠܝܼܩܝܼ ܕܡܲܠܲܒܵܪ ܣܘܼܪܝܵܝܵܐ) is an Eastern Catholic Church based in Kerala, India. Pazhayakoor (colloquial name for members) Saint Thomas the Apostle by tradition Ĥ.25 million worldwide as per Annuario Pontificio 2016 With diaspora in USA, Australia and Oceania, Europe, UK, Canada, and Nations of the Persian Gulf Liturgical Syriac, Malayalam, Syro-Malabarica, English, Tamil, Kannada, Hindi and most other Indian languagesĮast Syriac Rite - Liturgy of Mar Addai and Mar Mari
Holy Episcopal Synod of the Syro-Malabar Church